Disrupting education: One Googler's quest to get Google's tools into schools

Six million chromebooks into his job, it seems impossible that Jaime Casap did not come to Google to work on education. He's the company’s chief education evangelist, working to get technological resources into schools in order to disrupt poverty via education.

Jaime’s path to Google started with a Master’s in public policy and a stint in former New York Gov. Mario Cuomo’s office working on welfare reform. From government, he went into tech consulting with Accenture. And from there, he went to Charles Schwab to work on organizational issues in HR. When Google called, it was for a role in the office of then-CIO Douglas Merrill. When he started, Jaime says Douglas told him, “it’s going to take you about two years to figure out what you’re going to do here.” True to that guidance, in two years, Jaime jumped into a new role to focus on education.

The evangelist role came naturally to Jaime, who had previously worked outside of education but was passionate about the subject. Born in New York City’s Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood, he grew up on welfare and food stamps and now regularly speaks to students about why education and college are important. His message: “If I can do this, you can do this too.”

It’s not work when you’re passionate about what you do.

At Google, Jaime’s team went from working to convince leaders to do a Chromebooks for Education program—he got a “no” the first time he pitched the idea—to making Chromebooks the top-selling device for schools. “We started with a few classroom pilots, covering a few hundred students,” he says. “Today we have more than 10 million students across the globe. The impact you can have is tremendous.”

“You see the impact the teachers can have from the tools we bring to educators. I’ve grown into the evangelist role because I didn’t want us to be considered just a vendor. I wanted us to be thought leaders. I wanted us to be partners with the schools we work with. I wanted to paint the picture of why education is important, and why technology is important in education.” He’s on the road on purpose, he says, working to support Google’s teams, meeting with educators, policymakers, and superintendents.

Jaime’s work is impacting Google as well as the field of education. His team often shares best practices learned from 10 years of getting our technology solutions into schools—it’s sales, but with a mission. Jaime says that when he interviews, he actually looks for sales skills last. He says, “How to problem-solve is critical. When we hire on our team, that’s what we’re looking for. We want people to be creative.”

And he wants to grow. “I’ve watched us go from a few people to 100 people, and we don’t even have the whole world online yet,” he says. “Where in the world can you go to have a bigger impact on the thing that you care about than Google?”

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Disrupting education: One Googler's quest to get Google's tools into schools

Six million chromebooks into his job, it seems impossible that Jaime Casap did not come to Google to work on education. He's the company’s chief education evangelist, working to get technological resources into schools in order to disrupt poverty via education.

Jaime’s path to Google started with a Master’s in public policy and a stint in former New York Gov. Mario Cuomo’s office working on welfare reform. From government, he went into tech consulting with Accenture. And from there, he went to Charles Schwab to work on organizational issues in HR. When Google called, it was for a role in the office of then-CIO Douglas Merrill. When he started, Jaime says Douglas told him, “it’s going to take you about two years to figure out what you’re going to do here.” True to that guidance, in two years, Jaime jumped into a new role to focus on education.

The evangelist role came naturally to Jaime, who had previously worked outside of education but was passionate about the subject. Born in New York City’s Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood, he grew up on welfare and food stamps and now regularly speaks to students about why education and college are important. His message: “If I can do this, you can do this too.”

It’s not work when you’re passionate about what you do.

At Google, Jaime’s team went from working to convince leaders to do a Chromebooks for Education program—he got a “no” the first time he pitched the idea—to making Chromebooks the top-selling device for schools. “We started with a few classroom pilots, covering a few hundred students,” he says. “Today we have more than 10 million students across the globe. The impact you can have is tremendous.”

“You see the impact the teachers can have from the tools we bring to educators. I’ve grown into the evangelist role because I didn’t want us to be considered just a vendor. I wanted us to be thought leaders. I wanted us to be partners with the schools we work with. I wanted to paint the picture of why education is important, and why technology is important in education.” He’s on the road on purpose, he says, working to support Google’s teams, meeting with educators, policymakers, and superintendents.

Jaime’s work is impacting Google as well as the field of education. His team often shares best practices learned from 10 years of getting our technology solutions into schools—it’s sales, but with a mission. Jaime says that when he interviews, he actually looks for sales skills last. He says, “How to problem-solve is critical. When we hire on our team, that’s what we’re looking for. We want people to be creative.”

And he wants to grow. “I’ve watched us go from a few people to 100 people, and we don’t even have the whole world online yet,” he says. “Where in the world can you go to have a bigger impact on the thing that you care about than Google?”

Related Jobs

Sales Engineer, Cloud

Be a trusted technical advisor to customers as you guide them through their journey to the cloud. Shape the future of our products by advocating for your customers' requirements.

Share this

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